Erica Pinigis
Emily Shelton and Luella Shapiro are dancing in "Shifting Gears: Bike Path Dance Festival," from Isthmus Dance Collective.
On this hot and humid Saturday morning, dancers are kicking up clumps of freshly mowed grass while planes roar overhead on their Oak Street approach to the Dane County Regional Airport. Neighborhood dogs bark along to the eclectic music mix accompanying the modern dance class at Reger Park on Madison’s east side. A Sunday ballet class in Yahara Place Park features a backdrop of fishermen serenely floating by on Lake Monona and curious looks from passersby. Despite the weekend’s heat and humidity, the dancers seem genuinely happy to have a place to gather and work together.
The dancers are part of a new Madison group, the Isthmus Dance Collective. Eight local dancers convened in March 2020 to find a way to continue dancing, despite limitations imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. Initially the emphasis was on pooling their money to create COVID-safe dance classes, but a broader mission of collaboration emerged.
Founding member and current president Erica Pinigis, a Madison native who has danced professionally in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and California, wrote her thesis on cooperatively organized nonprofit dance organizations while earning a master’s degree in fine arts in dance at Mills College. That background provided the framework for Isthmus Dance Collective, which self-describes as a “democratic co-operative dance organization.” Art Moves, its first performance in April 2021, was virtual via Zoom.
The collective’s current summer session of dance classes includes advanced ballet and modern dance, virtually, and a Cunningham-inspired modern class and ballet, in the park. These are professional-level classes for members or drop-ins; there’s a suggested donation of $10 for virtual classes or $15 for outdoor classes, but to increase access, no one needs to pay to take part. Earlier this summer, the group offered more beginner classes. And plans are in the works for fall classes for the community.
“The key word is collaboration,” says Juan Carlos Díaz Vélez, founding member and vice president. Vélez, a ballet dancer, is also a UW-Madison astrophysicist and a member of Madison Ballet (after many years with Kanopy). Other members hail from Li Chiao-Ping Dance, Madison Ballet, UW-Madison dance department and other local dance companies. “IDC is a platform for individual artists,” says Díaz Vélez. “We saw a void that needed to be filled and we all have a lot to offer.”
The collective, a nonprofit, is dedicated to increasing diversity and equity in dance. Black Lives Matter protests last summer amplified the need for dance to be more inclusive, Díaz Vélez notes.
The group also wants to increase access to, and dialogue about, dance in Madison. Board members will serve short, rotating terms to avoid relying too heavily on one member’s expertise — as Pinigis puts it, “seeing what others have to share and taking the ego out of it.”
Rehearsals are underway for the group’s next performance, Shifting Gears: Bike Path Dance Festival, which will take place Sept. 6 from noon- 6 p.m. along city bike paths at Wirth Court Park, McPike Park and Olin Park (at “the vantage,” the nearest point to downtown, with the city’s skyline as a backdrop). It will feature pieces that showcase a wealth of dance forms from the collective and other area dance groups, including contemporary ballet, contemporary/modern, aerial, contact improv,, tap, flamenco, Bharatanatyam (classical Indian dance), and indigenous Mexican, Afro-Peruvian, Mongolian, Irish and Scottish Highland dance.
Pinigis, who is at the helm of Shifting Gears (both producing and choreographing some dances), was recently working with dancer Emily Shelton on a solo for the show that she described as her first overtly political work. It is demanding both in terms of the stamina and gravitas needed, as it addresses a litany of concerns facing our world, set to the Klezmatics’ poignant Come When I Call You. Pinigis says the group would “love to build our own space. Maybe convert a warehouse.”
Because Isthmus Dance Collective didn’t exist prior to the pandemic, it isn’t eligible for relief funds available to some arts organizations; the newly minted nonprofit seeks support through individual donations, volunteers and corporate sponsorships.
“With these wildly changing times, we have an opportunity to imagine something boldly exciting, and to build it from the ground up in a way that’s healthy and beneficial to all,” says Pinigis. “It’s hard work, but this collective has pushed through a year of pandemic so far and created something out of nothing. We’re just getting started on our dreams.”